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Al

Cross

Job title:

Director, Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues

Al Cross is director of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, based at the University of Kentucky, and an associate extension professor in UK’s School of Journalism and Media. He reported for The Courier-Journal for 26 years, the last 15½ as chief political writer, and continues to write a twice-monthly political column for the newspaper.

He was president of the Society of Professional Journalists in 2001-02 and is in the Kentucky Journalism Hall of Fame. His awards include a share of the Pulitzer Prize won by The C-J’s staff in 1989 for coverage of the nation’s deadliest bus and drunk-driving crash. He has been a contributor to books on politics and Kentucky.

He grew up in Albany, Ky., is a graduate of Western Kentucky University, and was an editor and manager at weekly newspapers in Monticello, Leitchfield and Russellville before establishing The Courier-Journal news bureau at Somerset in 1978.

If you have questions or comments, please contact Tricia Greyshock at triciag@pa-news.org or at (717) 703-3070.